Personal Effects
by LCFC
Summary: What we do in life affects not only us but those who come after us...


_I have never written anything like this, it might just be a ramble and not make an ounce of sense – but go with it!!_

_I don't own the Winchesters – damn!!_

When I was four years old I thought there was a monster in my wardrobe. I remember lying in bed at night, cold and trembling, watching the door and positive that I could see bright red eyes.

My mom hugged me and told me not to worry, whilst my daddy just looked at me, sad and resigned. He went to the basement and came back later, walking around my room and surrounding me in a bright, white ring of salt. He put salt on the sills of my windows too and he hung a strange charm above my bed, flicking it with his fingers to make it chime.

I felt better then and slept all night without nightmares.

There was nothing in my wardrobe after all.

I was a lonely child and wanted nothing more than to have a brother or sister. Daddy let me have a dog and that was nice but not the same. I asked my mom once why I was an only child but she just shook her head, eyes kind and reassuring.

"We love you sweetie," she said, "I'm sorry that you don't have a bigger family – but we just couldn't…" her voice trailed off then and she wiped at her eyes.

I felt guilty then and never asked again.

I had lived in England all my life and knew my grandparents on my mom's side, knew my aunties and uncles and my cousins but I knew nothing about daddy's family at all. Daddy didn't have a mom or a dad, both had died long before I was born and I felt sorry for daddy being an orphan. I heard mom mention that daddy had a brother once and I wondered what had happened to him? Had daddy had a fight with him? Was he out there somewhere looking for daddy?

We didn't have much money. Mom was a teacher but could only work part-time because she was looking after me. I was never sure what daddy did; I only knew it took him away for days on end and that I missed him when he was working. He always looked so tired when he came back and sometimes he looked hurt too.

Mom would hustle me away then and send me to bed, but I could always hear here through the thin walls of our house, comforting daddy and tending to his wounds.

Unlike the rich kids at school we didn't have satellite and I wasn't allowed to watch much TV. Daddy let me watch cartoons when mom wasn't around and we would huddle together in the den, watching things that daddy remembered. I asked him once if he missed America, missed his home and he shrugged, an arm tight around my shoulder. "This is my home now sweet pea," he said, rough and scratchy, "with you and mom,"

When I was twenty-two, the dreams came and they made me sick to my stomach. I dreamt about a shaggy-haired, yellow-eyed man standing at my doorway, smiling so sweetly at me, that I wanted to go to him, wanted to really badly. My college work suffered and, eventually, they sent me back home.

When I told my daddy what had happened, what I had seen, his face grew pale and closed up tight and hard. He gripped my hands tightly and I saw how old he was looking, saw the grey in his hair, the lines around his bright eyes.

"What did the man look like?" he asked, soft and gentle, and I told him.

I never expected him to cry like that.

My mom was shouting, tears running down her face. "I'm sick of hiding – sick of running," she sounded so angry that I couldn't bear to look at her and closed my eyes, hugging the pillow against my chest, "if you had only done it when he asked you to – we wouldn't be here now – our daughter would be safe and sound."

"He was my brother." Daddy stated, "he saved my life – he – he saved my soul – how was I to know…" he trailed off as he realised that I was watching him and he turned, abruptly and walked out of the door.

The next time I saw him he was packing things into the old duffle he had, mumbling about how much he hated flying and how he didn't ever want to do this again. I put my hand on his shoulder, squeezing it through the soft leather of the jacket he always wore and he smiled at me. "You look just like him." He said, softly, "I love you so much Sammy."

I let him hug me, a rarity from him, as he was not given to shows of affection. I wanted to ask him where he was going. What he was going to do, but the words caught in my throat and I didn't think he would answer me anyway.

That was the last time I saw him alive.

An old man called Bobby called to tell us about dad and I sat with my mom whilst she cried. I heard her talk about salt and burning bones and I felt sick to my stomach. When the call ended she took me in her arms and sobbed like she were the child and I the parent.

"I'm sorry, "was all she said and I didn't really understand.

They sent dad's personal effects to us and, for a lifetime, they didn't amount to much. Car keys for an old Chevy, locked up in Bobby's garage, his jacket, a few old journals, bound and yellowed, an old, faded picture of two little boys sat atop a black car, an older man smiling with his arms around their waist. The last photograph was of daddy, looking handsome and young, standing in front of an old roadhouse, another man next to him, long and slim, taller than daddy, hazel eyes sparkling and warm. The back of the photograph read 'Sam and Dean Winchester – May 2007'. I swallowed back bile and turned to my mom but she shook her head.

"I know," was all she said.

The dreams stopped and I went back to college. I graduated, became a teacher like my mom and had kids of my own.

They always ask about my daddy and I tell them he was a hero, that he saved the world that he saved me.

It is all I know and all I will ever know.

That is enough.

End


End file.
